Manipulator
by Princess Pinky
Summary: River is trying to find The Doctor, but the task ends up being more complicated than she'd planned.


**A/N: **Written for a request prompt, "River Song + Nine, lost in time." It was written months ago, I just never uploaded it to FFN.

_**Manipulator**_

"Where are we up to then?" she asked, without even bothering to turn around.

"Are you the one responsible for this?"

Eyes shot up, lips puckered, and fingers froze mid-turn of the page. The vocals were definitely ones she was not familiar with, yet something in the _way_ the words had been spoken rung recognizable. "Ah!" she grinned, lathering on her cool to match her black leather jacket. "Which one are you, Sweetie?" Spinning on her heel, she met cartoonish ears, a nose that belonged on a Halloween witch, and highly unfortunate clothes that gave off an Edwardian feel.

"I said," he spoke, simultaneously producing his sonic screwdriver in a most threatening manner. "Who are you?"

"Technically, you asked if I was responsible for 'this' and with such vague queries, you should ask yourself: how can I truly answer that?" In response to his bristling, she flipped open her diary to two pages that contained sketches of all Thirteen versions of her beloved. A small scribble of information was written beside some of them, such as string bean skinny one with wild hair, a younger looking one with a bowtie and tweed jacket, and a square jawed one that wore an ascot akin to that of the man in front of her. But upon coming to the face that matched that of the man himself, there was no description.

The Doctor's eyes caught the flash of blue in her hands and he tilted his head to get a better view. "What is-"

"Oh my," River cut in, slapping the diary shut and dropping it into the bag on her shoulder. "It looks like we haven't met yet, I sincerely apologize." She turned about face and slid her hand down the front of her shirt, retrieving a small tube. She lavishly applied a coating to her lips, smacked them a bit, then turned back to find The Doctor hovering over her with skeptical eyes. He grasped her hands, causing her to drop the tube, and she smiled cheekily. "Well aren't you the forceful one? I'll make note of that," she winked.

"How did you get us here?" he demanded, while pulling a pair of handcuffs from his inner coat.

River batted her hands down as though she was offering them to him for a manicure, easily allowing him to restrain her. She batted her eyelashes. "You and your handcuffs."

The Doctor ignored her flirtations and began to run his sonic up and down her, like a metal detector wand.

"Find anything you like?"

"Who are you?" he repeated, leaning his face into hers and searching her gleaming eyes.

"Spoilers!" she chimed. As he opened his mouth to retort, she tossed her cuffed arms over his head stole his words with a kiss, musing as his eyes began to roll lazily in their sockets. As he lost his restraint, she slowly lowered them both to the ground and extracted her arms from his neck. "I don't believe you'll be remembering this meeting, Sweetie." She reached for the sonic in his hands and twisted her hands, wrangling it into a position that allowed her to sonic the device on her wrists, causing it to unlock and drop off instantly.

She picked up the cuffs and dropped them into her bag. "These'll come in handy later," she confided to The Doctor, currently with a dopey smile beneath his hallucinating eyes. She snatched up her lipstick from the floor and gave it to her bag, in exchange for her diary. Using a pen from behind her ear – which had been concealed by her spiraling blonde curls – she jotted in a few quick notes about the latest version of her Doctor and added an asterisk to note that his wardrobe was identical to that of another version of The Doctor, which did not match the sketch. "Poor dear, have you regenerated recently?"

She sighed at his lackadaisical expression and peeled off the leather jacket she wore. "Here, it's too big for me anyway. And the undercover gig is over now anyway, Jack's taken off on me." River tucked the sonic into the pocket and draped the jacket over him. She patted the side of his cheek like a mother and then flipped about to face the small contraption she'd been standing in front of when he'd arrived. "Let's try this again, shall we?"

River connected a small wire to her vortex manipulator and systematically pressed the button while pulling a lever. In a spit of light and energy, The Doctor disappeared and a moment later, she heard another hiss synonymous with the use of the ripping vortex. Smiling, she flipped open her diary again and asked, "Now where are we up to?"


End file.
